


Torus

by deepandlovelydark



Series: Ecstasy in Cosmogone [4]
Category: Fallen London | Echo Bazaar, Sunless Sea
Genre: Canon Era, Duct Tape, Engineering, Rituals, Time Loop, queer, the sigil for a light-eating void
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-03
Updated: 2019-02-03
Packaged: 2019-07-06 05:37:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 8
Words: 8,204
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15879618
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deepandlovelydark/pseuds/deepandlovelydark
Summary: One night, to build the Fulgent Impeller.One night for the Captain, that is; one night for the officers, uneasy at their posts; one night for the crew, who sleep all unaware of Kingeater's doom. How many nights for the Tireless Mechanic?Why, just one.And then again.And again, and again, and again...





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Follows on from "Alike in Dignity". Aside from that, the story should be understandable without the rest of the series. 
> 
> Though somewhat more enjoyable, I'd reckon.

A single bell rings out (more melodious than the makeshift whistles on his old ship), and the Tireless Mechanic smiles. Alone.

Almost alone. The engines sing to him constantly now, like Neath wind, like witchcraft. The need for completion- for rest, finally for rest- burns through his bones, aching in anticipation of strain. He’s told the other crew to go sleep, nap a little before the rigours he’ll be demanding of them tonight. Helpful for several reasons. Not least of which is the chance to speed their passage, with an uncanny little ritual not meant for other eyes-

“Why rush things now?” the Cannoneer inquires, studying the kifer in his hand. “You’ve already pushed the engines far past their limit today. Putting systems out of joint is supposed to be my job, not yours.”

“That’ll hardly signify, once we make Kingeater’s.” The Mechanic sighs, tucks away the weapon. “It’s not your shift, so why are you down here?”

“Ooh, a bit of casual theft. Like so,” they say, stealing a kiss. “You know, you’re a very bad influence? There I am cramming away at Gatling blueprints or what have you, and the moment I think of you I get terribly distracted.”

“It’s been mentioned,” the Mechanic says, his amusement fading under recollection. “Pilot friend of mine used to fob off a line like that on me, whenever he was trying to borrow money- never mind.”

“You’ll be never minding me about that friend of yours for the rest of the voyage, won’t you?”

“Assuming both of us survive that long. Don’t tell the Captain, but I’m sort of- winging it, on this whole Impeller thing.” He places himself in front of a polished metal plaque, struggles to run a comb through soot-blackened hair. “I mean, I know what I need to build it-”

“I should hope so. Forty lots of ivory!”

“Thirty five,” the Mechanic corrects, allowing the Cannoneer to appropriate the comb and set to work with a will (this isn’t the first time they’ve played out this little ritual, with no permissions asked nor given). “No self-respecting spy could run a project this big without a bit of overhead, you know?”

“…Great Game, eh? Hah! Caught you out at last.”

“Maybe I’m a little tired of being so secretive, all the time. If I do die, I’d prefer it if there was at least somebody around who knew my name.”

“You’ve picked possibly the single worst person on this entire ship to be sentimental to, you’re aware.”

“Pretty much how I was on the Surface, too.”

“All right. If you want to say it, I’ll take it into my keeping, that’s really only fair exchange for letting me in on what you’re doing. The best engine on the Unterzee, and soon the best weapon- between the two of us, we’ll make this ship well-nigh unsinkable.”

“If I remembered what it was, I’d tell you,” the Mechanic says, reappropriating his comb and pulling back his hair in an impromptu queue. “Guess you’re the closest I’ve been to anyone since my old ship.”

“About which you are also absurdly secretive. Though I suppose your affiliation explains that.”

“Well, there isn’t that much to report. One crewmember who could be anywhere from Irem to Port Carnelian for all I know, one captain, presently deceased, one Rubbery- well, you’ve seen the Sage. And a navigator who threw over traveling to stare at rocks at Kingeater’s. She sent me a welcome message an hour ago by zee-bat, have a look.”

“Doom,” the Cannoneer reads off. “How terse. You two must have gone along like a house afire.”

“Nothing to be jealous about,” the Mechanic says, distinctly wry. “Did y’know that if you bleed on an engine just the right way, you can coax an extra knot or two of speed out of it?”

“…we’re not talking about just piling more supplies on the fire, are we?”

“No, no, this is something else. Ritual I invented, it's a hack. Want to watch?”

“Bodily harm in the pursuit of engineering,” the Cannoneer says. “I knew there was a reason I fell for you.”

The Mechanic looks very nearly sheepish.


	2. Chapter 2

Her father says that she musn't go to Hell, at least not until she's come of age, so Elizabeth has to catch the train from Moloch Street by herself. Again. On a first class ticket, though. The daughter of one of Universal Exports’ most important officers has the firm’s reputation to uphold.

Her own as well. She chats with sightseeing socialites, smiles at passing devils (on the whole, devils are friendlier; their admiration is unfeigned, if thirsty). The Inimitable Elizabeth has the charge of one of London’s most favoured salons, for which the Royal Family’s example has suited her perfectly. Select, discreet, allowing rumour and imagination to do her work for her.

Occasionally, just a little hint of steel.

Anyhow, she’s keeping the word of her promise. After descending the carriage’s crooked wrought-iron curlicues, she bypasses the Lancing Gates for the (comparatively gentle) madness of the Iron Republic. An odd place for a rendezvous, but the Unimaginative Assassin requested it. Presumably the man knows what he’s about.

She hopes he’s up to the task. Killers are ten a penny in London, but finding one who can deliver the permanent death is another task. To say nothing of her troubles finding anyone willing to slaughter this damnably winsome mechanic.

Three showers of hot coconut ices, two topographical manoeuvres, and an INCURSION later, she reaches the Rotating Rotunda. Constantly in motion, perpetually shifting its decors (at the moment it is black and white and red all over, and smells strongly of linseed oil), the place has a quality inordinately rare in the Republic: it’s something like a permanent destination.

The Assassin waves her down with a bloodied shoe-horn. He employs it to beat a cushion into submission and graciously seats her upon it.

“Arrogant things,” he explains. “They have an uncanny way of devouring socks, when left to their own devices.”

“My…thanks. You received my down payment?”

“Aren’t we to be well rewarded. That much rostygold would have been perfectly adequate from any of my other clients. Myself, I would cheerfully settle any little hampering score of yours for a quarter of it. The love of the profession for its own sake, you understand?”

He spears a passing pudding on his umbrella. Excellent rectilinear technique. Her spirits rise.

“Half as much again, when you complete the job.” She waves away the attentions of a blood-feathered Oi-Aggeloi, who is trying to lay a dirtied napkin on her lap. The fussy thing leaves, weeping.

“Cantigaster’s drippings? Hung, drawn and quartered? Or would you prefer a more fetching mode of death? I assure you, I’ve had no end of practice killing this Mechanic. Any way you like,” the Assassin adds brightly. He slices the pudding up with quick, even slashes, pours wine over a few pieces, offers her the rest.

She shakes her head. ”If that's what it takes. But remember, the engine’s what matters.”

"Stopping one impeller being built won't save Paris, you know. I believe half the French government is already trying to sell their city, and the other half is merely holding out for better terms."

 _La ville lumière…_ Elizabeth has to remind herself that this man will serve a purpose. Provoking his anger just for sullying the most lovely of all cities with his sardonic intelligence won’t help her cause. And it may sting to admit, but he’s right about the politicians.

“It’s a question of time. If the Fulgent Impeller is built and duplicated, if the Traitor Empress leads an exodus to the High Wilderness, the Bazaar will have to acquire another city immediately. There's only one viable prospect on the horizon right now."

“Oh? Meaning you're working on cultivating the attractions of an alternative?" He turns his attentions back to the abused pudding, poking experimentally with his kifer.

"You've been to Prussia, haven't you? The Empress's Eldest...but this is all by-the-by. Take this," she says, holding out a pocket watch. “The night before it’s due to be built. As many times as you need, until all’s well.”

“Not taking any chances, are you?” He holds the watch up to a wailing candelabra. The make’s too crude for ratwork, and the crystal is plain sapphire, but around the face winds a curiously-twisted torus. Colourless liquid chases itself round the little tube.

“As short a time as he’s been in the Neath, and they’re already singing songs about him at Wolfstack? Clearly you’ll be dealing with a man of infinite resource and sagacity,” Elizabeth says, her voice dry as dust. “Besides, I have a whole city’s welfare riding on your success.”

The Unimaginative Assassin flicks a lighter into action, watches the component pieces of pudding curl up into crisp ashes, then slowly begin to reconstitute themselves. Crumbs crawl helplessly about.

“So I’m to be on the side of good this time? What a topsy-turvy Neath this is. My dear, you have bought yourself an assassin.”

They just manage to shake hands on the deal before the whole building collapses around them, rebuilds itself as a very ugly opera house, and begins to sing Puccini.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...if you're thinking, "I suspect that was borrowed", it probably was.


	3. Chapter 3

_Four bells._

The Herald sleeps soundly, despite cold and fear and hunger. Nothing like a long swim in the Sea of Statues to tire out a body, and make it sleep without dreams.

Her schedule for the next several hours is precise and necessary, guided by the sureness of her rites. Nothing less will serve; it’ll take all the lore she holds, to see her old comrade’s engine built. An impeller new in the crafting, but old in conception, so eager to be born that its shadow has overhung her dreams for months- though that can’t account for all that worries her. So.

She opens her eyes at the correct moment, checks to see all her preparations are in readiness- they are- and settles back again to rest again. Just for another five minutes.

(Accounting for human frailty is one of the most obvious patterns in doom-saying, after all.)

*********

_Five bells._

The Unimaginative Assassin smiles, as his cutter-zub moves along the zee-bed.

“Clay Men to run the ship,” he says aloud. “My very own Neath-trained navigator to guide it. And all I have to do is wait and contemplate the execution.”

“I’d have preferred it if you’d done all your planning ahead of time,” Elizabeth says, rather crossly. “By my reckoning, we’ve only a few hours before the Impeller’s built. We’re cutting matters very fine.”

“My dear Elizabeth- may I call you that?”

“As you have done for the entire voyage here, I fail to see why you’re questioning it now.”

“My dear Elizabeth. Were I to develop a plan, that plan might be fallible. The true mark of an assassin’s mettle is to live moment to moment, fully aware of the world at large, ready to adapt to all contingencies. Ours is a flexible and untethered profession.”

“…I wonder whether I’ve bought the right tool for the job.”

“You have.”

He wonders whether he could possibly have a more irksome employer; but never mind. She’s paying him to do what he’d attempt regardless, and that’s too delightful a chance to pass up.

(Back on the Surface, he’d always pulled his punches; but this is the Neath, and all’s fair down here. Even true death.

Seeing as it’s so very much more difficult to accomplish.)

*********

_Six bells._

The Mechanic listens with pleasure to the crunch of snow underfoot, as he walks across the wastes. Their arrival had been so quick, they’d very nearly beaten the zee-bat home. His Herald will be not a little surprised-

“Quick,” she whispers. Inconspicuous motion from the shadows.

Down three flights of narrow, ill-tempered stairs, to her solitary sanctum. No fire could make Kingeater’s warm, but she hasn't even attempted one; just a few blubber-lamps to light the gloom. His conscience reproaches him, seeing the desolate surroundings (what happened to the black curls he remembers, her calm aristocratic airs? Now the former are cropped close, and as for the latter...)

 _Hush_ , the Mechanic tells himself. _She knew what she did, when she came._

"Brought some supplies for you," he ventures. "Surface treats, proper biscuits. More than enough for two."

"Does that mean you’ve been fasting?" she asks, studying his packages with unmistakeable hunger.

"Uh, I guess. Thought I'd bring enough so we could have tea together, like old times-"

"Not yet," she cuts him off (old familiar impetuousness). "Rituals first."

"Doom and so forth?"

"I don't know yet," the Herald says, her mouth twitching. "There's a ship approaching. A man aboard with no reflection, does that sound familiar?"

The Mechanic nods. "Someone from my time, you mean, overcoming the treacheries. But who would it be?"

(Wild unexpected hope in his heart- his unacknowledged love-)

"I planned to look myself, but you'd be better. There's something on the unwinds the likes of which I've never encountered. Can you handle a little witchcraft, these days?”

“With my Impeller to build? I’d hope so.”

“All right. You know I can manage sendings through zee-bats-”

“Sure.”

“Then if you know so much, try it yourself.”

He gapes at her, bewildered. She carries over a plump little specimen, white as Frostfound snow, and lets the small creature’s talons sink into his arm.

“Hang on, I can’t handle this just now. Just had a blood-letting and everything.”

“You’ll hardly notice this loss,” the Herald says, with a raging impatience he remembers distinctly well. Only from the gravest crises, though. “And we’ve next to no time. Innocent, you have to!”

Quite the wrong naming, but the invocation still holds power; he obeys. Accepts her murmured instructions like the novice reppeljack he once was, instead of a scarred, experienced Neath officer-

and he’s flying through air, with all a bat’s natural sensitivity and joy for heights (helpful, that). Almost ecstatic with the experience, but not so overwhelmed by it as to forget his mission (no one ever resigns the Game). Gazing down at the ship docked below with the shock of familiarity, then turning his attention to the one approaching. Just the slightest wake on the surface of the water to show its passage at first, but it rises quickly. Making for the grey, time-tarnished dock.

A man ventures out before the ship’s even risen properly, kicking driftweed out of his path. Smiles sharply. Aims at the zee-bat, and fires-

and the Mechanic’s left gasping for breath in the Herald's chamber, as if he's taken the bullet himself.

_Calm down. You've done that before, and this one's imaginary._

The Herald sighs, and sets a battered old engine running; it chokes and fumes, but finally starts to warm the place. "Now we can eat. You knew who it was?"

"Surface ties. An assassin come to kill me- I never thought- why didn't I think? Of course that's why I couldn't ever kill him, he's probably got cider or something."

"An immortal assassin after you,” she says, shaping cheese and crackers into hearty sandwiches. “How is it you're not dead?"

Her manner’s certainly as self-possessed as ever. ”I’m a pretty good player. He lost every time we matched wits. But what he's planning here…I don’t like this, Herald, not one bit. We might all end up dead before this is over.”

“But what are his powers?” she demands. “What rituals might he command?”

“Um…nothing special I can think of. He preferred the brutally straightforward approach. Fire. Guns. That sorta thing. I can’t think what you might be picking up on, ‘less it’s just my death.”

“That wouldn’t be nearly catastrophic enough for what I’ve been envisioning,” she says, closing her eyes. He taps her on the shoulder; she grunts and starts eating without looking. “Though you’re certainly in the thick of it.”

He starts in on the biscuits. “Any chance we could keep my ship out of it? They, uh- they think I’m mostly sorta normal, I think. Which was nice while it lasted.”

“Unless you have a decent doom-sayer aboard, I can’t see that they’d be very much help regardless. Barring another assassin?”

“…not anymore. Too bad about our Adventuress,” the Mechanic says glumly. “I think you’d have liked her. She probably could have done and dusted any kind of threat in five minutes flat- you know what, I think you’d better go aboard my ship. Safer for you that way, and I’ve always managed him before.”

“Don’t be so egotistical. Whatever threat he’s bringing to bear, I’ve no intention of letting you handle it alone. This isn't the Surface, and you can't tackle all your problems with a smile and a roll of duct tape.”

"Takes you further than you'd think, though," he mutters. "I just hate the idea of anybody else getting caught up in our squabbles. Always scared me stiff, that somebody I loved was eventually going to get killed in the crossfire- well, you worry about that kind of thing a lot in my profession."

"You're a mechanic now," the Herald reminds him. "Stick to getting that engine built so that you can leave as soon as possible, I'll see about holding him off until then. Kingeater's isn't an easy place to be, but I've learnt a few of its secrets now. You should be safe for a few hours."

"A few hours is all we'll need, for the actual physical labour. For the heart-" he starts, and falters. 

"You know what the heart is."

"Maybe that's what called my assassin here. Maybe he knows- maybe he's just being drawn to me, moth to the waiting candle. Maybe it's only fair exchange for what I'm about to do. If I build that engine, and finish my destiny, and as good as murder the Sage, why shouldn't he have his way with me after that?"

"There's always mercy at the Gate," the Herald says, soft and sympathetic. "You could always refuse to build the engine."

She expects a laugh, and a shamed acceptance of fate; but he looks at her with eyes that are very nearly hopeful. 

Oh dear. 


	4. Chapter 4

Near the vanishing horizon, where Parabola's shallows give way to the depths of the High Wilderness, there rests a watchful island.

Once it served as a Master's private sanctuary, for Correspondence trails and dream-study. Later, it became a haven where mourning flourished, hatred festered. Winking Isle's reputation for woe ensures its solitude from all except the most devoted of Seekers- and they're lost to any but their own pursuits. 

The Atheist Cartographer stops, breathless, at one of the innumerable brick-enlaid landings. This lighthouse has seven thousand steps, rough and uneven under heel; and she is regretting every one of them. 

"You know, we could have dreamed ourselves up. There's that much compensation for immateriality."

"That would have been ostentatious," the Innocent Spy tells her, not quite keeping the smile from his face. "Besides. A little exercise is good for you."

"A little, yes. How long will it take to teach you the joys of a happy medium?"

"What would you know about it? You're as bad an extremist as I am, any day."

There's truth to that, and then some; and besides, she's not much inclined to quarrel this close to the threshold. Things will shortly be unpleasant enough, without- 

"Hurry up down there!"

The voice echoes down the spiral; she has a sudden vision of the sound falling towards them, like rain in a well. The Innocent sets his mouth, seeks her hand in the half-light. 

(As lovers, they are ludicrous. Forever grasping, pressing for comfort, clutching shamelessly at each other's bodies, theirs is an onanistic pleasure even at its most mutual. Reassurance that they are alive, just as well as the other.)

The Cartographer takes his rough-weathered palm, and lets old instinct guide her. "We won't go any faster for your bellowing, Student!"

A disgusted silence falls, and she smiles; but as they start upwards again, they take the steps at speed. This island had been his last and fondest hope, hunting for a Seeker unwary enough to surrender everything for a false consummation. Some had been too clever, others plain frightened; but one careless, impatient soul had seized gladly on the shortcut. 

When that effort had failed, that was when his despair began in earnest. 

"I'm running out of time," the Student says, when they enter the lantern room. 

He does not look well. Reflection of nothing, he has about him the consumptive's fragility, the sickness of rainbows in water. In the old days of Parabola, nothing so weak could have survived for long. A dragon would have taken him. Or a twining vine, or pebbles on the shore; or any ravenous onlooker, brought to madness by tempting vulnerability. 

(She blinks twice, rapidly, and wonders what truths her Innocent will never have the chance to hear. Forgiveness is harder than guilt.)

"We're close to apotheosis now," the Spy says (she can recognise now when he changes, how he shifts names according to need). "Their ship's at Kingeater's now, and- and you were right. I was right the first time. There's no good laying the cornerstone on faithless ground."

He's wrong, the Cartographer knows. If martyrdom is the price of their Impeller, it had still been freely offered, and lives depend on that crafting. 

"I thought I'd live, and see such strange wisdoms as I'd never bear in my right senses," the Student murmurs. "I thought I'd see the false stars die, the Seventh City's fall, Judgments turning in their courses. Or perhaps I'd end like my fellows, I could have borne that with equanimity. Not this. Not fading away, untouchable- yes, I'll help you. Any way I can."

"Thank you," the Innocent says. With a step forward, a lift of the head, as though he speaks for them and all their tortured brethren. 

She hates herself now, for claiming weakness as a virtue, and allowing herself so much softness. That woman who walks the Neath, who keeps close counsel and stands unwavering in her solitude, would warn against this course of action. Doom-saying, weighed against her silk-light lusts, hardly seems fair measure. 

But even in this moment she cannot help admiring his steadfast resolution, his forthright hope, and through these she loves, not only him, but herself again.


	5. Chapter 5

The Assassin enters, murder in his heart.

The Mechanic eyes him. Throws a kifer with swift and practiced accuracy.

“That was a flag of truce,” the Cynical Herald points out. Indicates the fallen distaff, with a white spider-silk handkerchief tied to the end of it.

“Uh. Sorry about that,” he tells the gurgling Assassin. “Though I guess an apology isn’t much good, is it?”

_Tick._

The Assassin enters, murder in his heart.

The Herald briskly runs him through with a harpoon.

“Useful little thing. Washed up one day, I check the beach every morning to see if there’s anything salvageable.”

“That was a flag of truce he was carrying! See the white handkerchief?”

“Yes. Well, it’s red now, isn’t it?”

_Tick._

“I hold your true name, Mechanic,” the Assassin whispers. “Writ on a list of gant.”

“So? I’ve been getting on all right without it. Guess I can stand not knowing, after this long.”

“But suppose I’ve taken this name, with a snipping of scissors and a rite unnamed. Burn in the flame from a stolen Seeker’s candle. Shall we see what that does to you?”

The Mechanic quivers, but holds his ground; the Herald whispers something that makes him laugh. Warm, cheerful laughter, that continues long after the name’s burnt to ash, and the target none the worse for it.

“All right, I’ve had better plans,” the Assassin admits.

“Wonder what happens if we try yours?” the Mechanic says, as he scribbles six letters and tosses the scrap in the fire.

What follows is not a pleasant sight.

“How the hell did that- what have I done- oh, god,” he says, retching bodily.

“Mechanic, have I taught you nothing?”

_Tick._

“You only have to kill him once,” Elizabeth says, passing him a glass. “It’s been seven nights now, natural time. How is it that you haven’t managed yet?”

“He’s cheating. That Herald warned him I was coming.”

She still pouts like a Surface tourist, pretty and meaningless, though she swigs the port like a Queen’s Own. “That shouldn’t make a difference. You’re the professional.”

“Opponents in the Game are always hardest to kill- the last time anybody managed, it was a group effort. The targets on somebody’s hit list banded together to take her down first. Rather clever about it, too…”

“Do you think I paid this much, to hear so many excuses?”

He would make a light-hearted remark, if only all the air hadn’t vanished. Gasping, furious, he seizes the traitorous drink, hurls it towards her with all his might.

“It occurred to me,” Elizabeth says, dispassionately stepping over the broken glass, “that I had an ideal opportunity to focus your attention. Please don’t dally next time.”

“I suppose I could always outsource it….” he manages, before dying.

_Tick._

So they try the job together, this time.

An embattled Cannoneer observes their passage and blows them up on sight.

_Tick._

“You’re quite certain that this wretched device will keep working, until I get it right?”

“Oh, it will. It will.”

“That’s beginning to concern me,” the Assassin informs her. “Generally speaking, something’s interrupted me by now. To have so many chances speaks of the universe having gone somewhat awry-”

“Tell me something,” she interrupts. “Is it that you never intended murder at all, or that you’re too much in love with the execution to ever consummate the act?”

“…I am extremely good at murder,” he says eventually.

“You have the most abysmal pout I have ever seen. Worse than that dreadful French governess I had once.”

He kills her with the sharp end of a quill, just to make the point; but of course, that doesn’t stop the ticking.

_Tick._

The Tireless Mechanic looks on, grimly. ”I’ve met him. Mur-"

"Now, now. You should have been here long enough to know about names."

"Murdoc," the Mechanic pronounces, in distaste. "I'm not interested in playing whatever silly game is up your sleeve this time. And I've got a lot to do tonight without your interference."

"The Unimaginative Assassin, isn’t it?” the Herald puts in. “One of the less respectable of the Sanguine Ribbon duellers.”

"Unimaginative- him? That can't be right."

The Assassin looks rather put out. “I was an inexperienced novice when I acquired that use-name. My work’s improved quite considerably since then.”

“And yet, you still haven’t managed to kill me yet,” the Mechanic says, just the hint of a taunt underlying his thickened Surface accent.

The remark throws him off his stride. Quite in keeping with their Surface encounters, the Assassin realises a moment later- but a moment too late to duck the Mechanic’s innovative use of a paper-knife as a guillotine.

How deucedly touchy of him.

_Tick._


	6. Chapter 6

By now, they have this down to a ritual. 

Twenty minutes grace, between the time when the Assassin activates his torus, and his ship making Kingeater's; twenty minutes that wouldn't have done them any good, if not for her doom-saying and the Mechanic's kindness. He might have taken the chance to rest after his labour, instead of hurrying out to meet her; and if he'd slept aboard his ship, the Assassin might have killed him on the first cycle. 

Though his exhaustion's part of their problem. The Mechanic always starts the cycle asleep, shivering in the castle's unreasonable cold, and his dreams leave him disorientated. It takes a little while before either of them can trust in his ability to tell reality and parabola apart, and by then they're cut off from the harbour. No chance to ask for his company's aid, or access the Mechanic's supply of cunning engineering implements, so they must needs rely on what he can piece together from her few and meager possessions. 

Step two of the ritual, then. By gutting the engine that warms her chambers, with a little of this and a little of that and the blade of her ravenglass knife, they can build an unwieldy device that will warn them precisely where the Assassin's curious timepiece is (and thus the Assassin himself). After so many repetitions, the Herald suspects she could craft it herself; but it's even faster to drop the Mechanic a hint and let him do it. His hands move with such rapid, nice precision. 

Step three is to run. 

The castle is a labyrinth, for purposes far more intricate and unknowable than the hunger-dedicated altar that stands at Pennington; and she regrets now that she hadn't explored its windings more thoroughly. 

"I had the opportunity, and didn't take it," she explains to the Mechanic, as they walk through corridors so deserted, dust has never dared to fall. "When I wasn't studying, I'd go out to the zee, fishing and watching for ships...you can see a glimpse of Stone's light sometimes, when the wind's dropped. Perhaps I should have fasted more."

"You'd probably have gone mad by now," the Mechanic says, quickening his pace. "This place was never meant for inhabitation, I don't know how you stand it."

The further deep they go, the more anxious he becomes; there are cycles when he'll falter at his own shadow, or her candle, when he becomes too conscious of the weight above their heads and starts whimpering for comfort. His spirit's in a liminal state, troubled by the sacrifice hanging over him, and she's come to suspect that their current plan can't succeed. 

Insofar as it can be called a plan at all; their notion during the first cycle was just to hide away from the Assassin, for long enough to come up with a better idea. At the moment it keeps failing because the Assassin always corners them down an unexpected dead end; but even if they find a route deep into Kingeater's heart, it won't do them any good if the Mechanic's unable to traverse it. 

"Say something," the Mechanic implores. "Anything. Tell me something, how are you remembering all this?"

"Doom-saying. That's not quite the same as remembering, it's foresight- though in a situation as dire as this, I suppose there's little difference." The more often they repeat this inane cycle, the clearer she'll know; but she hasn't practiced the art for so long without learning how to grasp the essential details. "Normally, I might look to my visions for advice on how to avoid a fate, but under current peculiar circumstances I can't seem to see any further than tomorrow morning."

"...that's not going to do your mental stability much good, is it?" the Mechanic asks, with a crooked smile. "Living out so much time, without the chance to recite your daily rituals?"

She hesitates. He apologies, takes her salt-roughed hand in his own callused one. 

"You know I don't swear oaths much, Herald. Or at all."

"I know."

"But there's a promise I always was in the habit of keeping," he says intently, dark eyes fixed on her own. "When I told someone I'd get them out of a mess or die trying, back on the Surface-"

"I wouldn't let the universe hear you say that, down here," she returns. 

"And it didn't always work," he agrees, all wry deprecation now. "But I'll tell you this, Herald. If you're hurt before this is over- if he kills you permanently, just because he doesn't care who else he slaughters trying to get at me, he'll meet just the same fate. I'll do it myself."

"That's assuming you can," the Herald says lightly. 

The Mechanic's expression twists into something she's not observed from him before, and doesn't like in the least. "As you may have noticed, he doesn't have much of a track record in that department."

Without looking, he tosses the heavy tracker over his shoulder, hard enough to smash open a man's skull; and the cycle resets amidst the Assassin's screams. 

(She doesn't know everything that happened, as she wakes a sleeping Mechanic from his fitful rest.)

(But that she must get him away from this death-wrought place, that much is sure and certain.)


	7. Chapter 7

"You know, I do have to admit it. I'm not quite as excitingly foolhardy as my reputation suggests," the Irrepressible Cannoneer informs the zee-bat perched aboard their porthole door. "For instance, I don't go out and shoot down random passing ships without my captain's approval, just because a mysterious note says to do it."

The zee-bat chirps, in the way that the creatures do. They study the note again, unfamiliar writing in a flowing italic hand. 

"Moreover, we probably couldn't even hit it from here without moving out of dock, and there's no end of chaos that'd bring about, if we left port without our Mechanic. Do you know what happens to officers who aren't aboard when a ship zails? Last time it happened without the captain's permission, the Masters got involved."

Chirp. 

"You're not convinced either, are you...well, look, I'll write out a message." They seize a grease-pencil, and a length of blueprint paper. _If you want me to do anything so daft, Mechanic, write me yourself next time._

The zee-bat takes it, in good part; but never returns with the reply. 

(Deep in Kingeater's an assassin gets himself impaled on a sharpened teaspoon, not that the Cannoneer ever knows about that.)

***********

"I do have to admit it. Just because it's definitely from him, doesn't mean I'm going to do anything quite so excitingly foolhardy...I mean, somebody might be making him write this. Why isn't there a delicious rude secret that nobody except us knows? Like all those stories in _The Sapphire._ If he put something like that in this note, I might trust it more."

(Through an unfortunate series of small accidents, the assassin manages to fall overboard and drown before even reaching Kingeater's. His employer is not impressed.)

***********

"All right, so it's definitely him, and- ooh, I'd forgotten about that," the Cannoneer says, chuckling as they read. "Gloom light to darken places, if that wasn't the Neathiest idea I'd ever heard. Okay. Honestly, though, it's as much as his career's worth, to start shooting without the captain's authority. To say nothing of mine. Is it really this important?"

(The assassin slips on a fungal patch, and decapitates himself without external intervention.)

***********

"Why aren't we asking your captain for help?" the Herald asks. "I don't even know how many variations of this note we've sent out now, but it must be quite a number."

"You haven't met my captain," the Mechanic says. 

"What of it?" 

"Don't." 

"Don't? You can afford to be less terse than that."

"No, I really daren't..."

***********

The Irrepressible Cannoneer reads a brief note, frowns, and races up to the gun deck for some extremely precise weapons drill. It takes a very careful eye to obliterate a ship, while leaving the bridge intact; and in all honesty, they suspect nobody else could have managed the feat. 

So the Assassin's taken alive, and questioned, and imprisoned, all of which he accepts with curious acquiescence; and he waits patiently while a few trusty stokers go in search of their Mechanic, to give cheer and report all well. 

Waits patiently until the dawn, that is. 

***********

The Mechanic wakes, to find his comrade weeping into the corner of his poncho. 

"It didn't work," she tells him. Full of rage and tears, so hollowed otherwise. "Tomorrow morning, that's the torus' limit- it's just the one night your Assassin's given himself! Of all the stupid, risky maneuvers, he's doomed himself and us!" 

"Unless he kills me?" That might not be the worst fate, all told, he thinks; it'd save him deciding about the Sage. 

"That might work," the Herald says, quietly. "Or it might trap us in his time loop forever, I wouldn't know. My family's never consorted with hell magics, it's not profitable trading. Innocent, I wanted to be here, but for a little time, not the rest of eternity!" 

He holds her, gently, while her sobbing breaks out anew. Contemplates the hardness in his heart. It makes no sense that he might remember this again, if they're caught as she describes; but there is a hatred forged in cold to consider, and every ounce of his Great Game training, and the brokenness that has haunted him, ever since a wretched captain caught him for a blood-tinged destiny. If he can't put his talents to use in saving this one precious life, he's not the engineer he thinks he is- and that makes it a professional challenge.  

Because he must get her away from this death-wrought place, that's for sure and certain. 


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A few quick notes, if you're not up to speed on "Fulgent Engineering". Flexions are what Reflections call us; the Spy is the Mechanic's Parabolan counterpart, the Cartographer is the Herald's. Entering Parabola via dreaming involves possessing your Reflection's mirror-body, rendering them helpless (unless your Reflection has a very strong will...but the Student's attempts to switch places with the Sage haven't gone very well.)

“Welcome to Parabola.”

The words make the Mechanic tense, as ever. He’s almost grown used to sleeping again, dreaming the Neath’s strange dreams, but the reminder that he does so only by taking another’s body is one he could do without. Not all of his reflection’s relaxed assurances that this is expected, the natural course of things, will ever soothe his mind on this point.

“Sorry,” he tells the Cartographer. “Just taking a quick nap, promise. Then you’ll have your spy back.”

“So you still don’t remember. He thought you might, after that last cycle...oh, well.”

“Remember what?”

“Never mind me,” she says, her tone meek. (It’s always a surprise to him, how much he dislikes this woman’s acquiescence; but it’s the point of divergence between her and her flexion, and one that does the reflection no favours.) “It’ll all be explained to you, soon enough. Be of good cheer.”

She’s out and away before he has a chance to protest; he sighs, looks around the surroundings for the first time. Not so bad as it might have been. The cell is locked, and sparingly furnished; but the stones are warm beneath his feet, and a gap in the wall reveals the sea glittering brilliantly below. Hard even for him to feel claustrophobic in surroundings such as these. Not when the peace of the place sings through him, like the gloried, unspeakable wonders of a faery tale.

Where is here? He makes a point of forgetting his dreams, where possible; and his reflection’s usually content to allow that- but it’s inconvenient at times like these, when something might be asked of him that impinges on them both. There ought to be a notebook in his breast pocket, and so there is; but the pages are all blank. Whatever’s going on, the Innocent’s apparently expecting him to handle it in ignorance.

“I guess I’ve had worse missions, but it’s sure exasperating when you’ve done it to yourself…”

Annoyed, he lets himself sink further into sleep, into this flexion’s body that can never quite be his. It’s too perfect, comforting, idealised. Then again, so’s his own these days (Neath immortality has its points, but he doubts he’ll ever feel right again); and this form approximates his age a little more closely, at least. He exhales, lightly strokes one hand against the other, ruffles already unruly hair. All the little rituals to feel at home again.

Course, it won’t feel quite right until he’s made something be, fixed or improvised or crafted. There’s fruit on the table, small brown pears and leafy apples, and a sleeping silk on the floor. It takes no time at all to knock up a knotted carry-bag. Nothing else in the cell to bring along, unless he wanted a table leg for a weapon, and that he doesn’t.

Besides, it’ll be inconvenient where he’s going.

A wave of acrophobia sets in when he steps onto the stone sill, and eyes the long way down: fear he might not wish to be freed from for the asking, when it sets his heart fluttering with such interest each time, this vivid pushing away of death. And it keeps him careful. Each step, as he makes his way down the castle’s rough-hewn exterior, is as cautious as though his life really did depend on it. Perhaps no Finger-King haunts him now, but he’s learnt to treat Parabola with great care.

The effort is, paradoxically, wearying. By the time he reaches bottom (a rocky shore, giving way to the deepest of sea water), he’s tired enough to consider surrendering into dreamless sleep. But instinct tells him no, and that’s warning enough here. Instead he consumes an apple and pear in alternating bites, concentrating to distinguish between their tastes. It takes slow, meditative focus to get goodness out of anything in this realm, even the foodstuffs; a moment of carelessness and he might find himself holding a broken reed, or a handful of sand. That’s happened to him before.  

“Not a place for multi-taskers, Jack,” the Mechanic says aloud. “You wouldn’t like it one bit.”

The water is fresh, in one of Parabola’s usual paradoxes. He scoops it in his hands, drinking with thirsty relish; his whole attention focused upon it, so that when somebody shoves him into the water it comes as a complete shock.

Not a hardship- the water’s even warmer than the air- but he swims hard, exhilarated and exercised, until the slight breath in him is used up. Even then he pushes a little further before surfacing, to see a familiar profile waiting on the shore.

“What was all that about?”

“Couldn’t resist!” the Student yells back; and the Mechanic finds he can’t speak, for bright cheerful relief. He swims back to shore, more languidly this time.

“You’re looking well. I was expecting the Sage’s reflection to be a bit more- um….”

“Green and rubbery?” the Student returns, putting his feet up against an odd-shaped chunk of granite. “Good news on that front. I’ve been just about hanging on, and I think I’ve figured out how to stabilise my condition. All you have to do is not build that Impeller...and to be honest, I don’t think you have much of a shot at that anyway. Given that assassin who’s been chasing you.”

“What assassin?”

The Student harrumphs, noisily, and crosses his arms. It seems to be disconcerting him, directing pithy comments at an audience bobbing in the water below him. “You’d think after forty repetitions, you’d retain _something_ of what was going on. All right. It’s an old friend of yours from the Surface-”

“Oh not him-”

“And he has you trapped in a time loop,” the Student continues, in bored tones. “Which you haven’t figured out how to break yet, so I doubt you’re going to. At least in Parabola you’ll be able to carry on normal life, after a fashion- I mean, it may only be dreams but it’s certainly better than what’s happening to you now.”

“It doesn’t count if I don’t remember it,” the Mechanic demurs. “And entropy’s in my favour there, I’m bound to break out eventually.”

“Fair enough,” the Student allows. “But what if there was somebody who did remember? Every distressing moment of it, every distasteful minute?”

“Stop beating around the bush and explain yourself. Because if it’s Murdoc, he probably deserves it.”

“Of course not him. Would you care to come out and dry off?”

“...not just yet,” he says, treading water. “I haven’t been swimming anywhere this nice since I quit the Surface- well, perhaps Port Carnelian in a pinch.”

“Then suit yourself. It’s a good hour’s walk from this part of coast to where we’re going, but if you want to swim it, swim.”

The Mechanic sighs and gets out. That much water wouldn’t do his gant-handled knife any favours, anyway.

*************

It takes rather less than an hour actually, with him to set the Student a decent pace; but more than enough time to realise where they are.

Kingeater’s Castle: but set under Parabola’s clean skies, serene and lapped by dappled waters. Not exactly the place he’d choose to be trapped indefinitely. No machinery to mend, no factions to infiltrate, nothing complicated enough to hold his interest. Bereft of its usual night horrors, it isn’t even frightening. Eternity here must be a horrifying sort of blandness.

So the Mechanic’s all but ready to make the effort, set his teeth and let down his old friend (“ _you promised me this engine, in Frostfound, and I have your naming to prove it_ ”)- after all, he hasn’t played the Game so long without learning to take self-sacrifice at its worth. Which this is. It’s just that the ghost hasn’t stopped moving yet.

But short of that, he’ll make any reasonable effort at cheer; and so when the Student hurries him through six cold-forged gates and bids him enter a tower alone, he climbs up without a second thought.

“Herald?”

(Even with her back to him, the difference in posture would be a sure tell.)

“Mechanic,” she says, without turning; her cell parallels his in every detail, though she’s touched nothing in it. “I wondered if you’d agree to stay. You always held such advanced notions about reflections.”

A thought that hasn’t escaped him; staying here forever means condemning their delicate, vulnerable dream-selves to an eternity of impotent nonexistence. “Frankly, I don’t want to. I mean, just to be selfish about it I’d really like to see that Impeller fly.”

“Forty repetitions,” the Herald says. Calmly. “You realise that if you keep testing your luck, your Surface friend might succeed in ending the loop the way he intends to? By killing you?”

“I’ll take that risk.”

“It’s not you taking the risk!” Her reflexes aren’t trained for violence like his- he could have ducked down, kicked her away, before she came anywhere near laying hands on him- but he lets her do it nevertheless. “I’m the one who has to nursemaid you through it every time, who has to remember and fret and carry over sums- do you know how many murders I’ve watched you commit? How many deaths I’ve had to arrange on your behalf? Over and over again?”

The assassin couldn’t have been her first, the Mechanic tells himself; clings to that guess with desperate uncertainty. “I’ll get it right one of these days. Don’t you have any confidence in me?”

He’s learnt from a master, how to keep up a jaunty tone when all else is collapsing; how to lie and lie and seem sane at the end of the day. She snorts at him, and throws herself down on the sleeping silk, shivering despite the still, blood-warm air; he longs to give her comfort and can’t think how to do it.

(If she wanted him to take her, she’d have brought him down too and made no bones about it.)

“If I stay here, I’m safe,” she says, her voice deepening in horror. “Now- right now, when you’re asleep, I dragged myself into Parabola on your dream-trail. This one moment’s secure for both of us. If I give it up, we might never get here again.”

His head aches with dilemma; bewildered, he sits beside her, just out of reach. “So if I dream, I condemn our reflections, and my destiny’s never accomplished-” _how it hangs over him, and purchased at such price_ \- “and if I wake, you go mad. The Student’s lost for good. Or possibly I get killed into the bargain, and the Impeller’s never built regardless.”

“This isn’t our Kingeater’s,” the Herald says. “This is a soft and gentle place, with belled cloisters and orchards to dream in- nor is it our zee, for that matter. We could build ourselves a ship, and travel waters of such strangeness, none have returned to tell that tale- there’s adventure enough to stir your blood, isn’t it?”

It is; but he shakes his head in negation. “I’d lose myself altogether. A dream inside a dream- somewhere out there is a land drowsing beneath real sunlight, Herald. I want that back.”

“Tell me truth, not convenient platitudes. If Judgement light was all you wanted, you’d be toiling away for cider instead of building an altar.”

“All right, I want someone back.” _This one binding to anchor me, when all else fails in the night._ “The lover I never held, the joy unconsummated, who never let me abandon life however hard I tried- I’ve got unfinished business with that damned hustler, and no dreamy pseudo-heaven’s going to stop me finding him!”

The Herald glances towards him with muted interest. “That’s rather more than you’ve ever cared to confirm about your love life. I assume we’re not still discussing the assassin.”

He must, he suspects, be burning rosy as a candle. “Christ, no.”

“Ah,” she says, softly. Starts to giggle. This whole business must have broken her already, he reckons; or else she’s picked up odd habits in the years she’s spent alone here. Which can’t be helping either.

“I’ve thought up a plan,” he says abruptly. “Something that’ll give everybody what they want. Or almost everyone.”

Everyone except his old captain, who died for this engine; and the new one, who’d kill for it.

Well. Time enough for them to learn, they’re not the only travelers on this Unterzee...


End file.
